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NCAA MEN'S 2ND & 3RD ROUNDS: WASHINGTON

March 17, 2011

Cashmere Wright

WASHINGTON, D.C.

Cincinnati Â– 76
Missouri - 63

MODERATOR: Joining us at the podium at this time are Cincinnati Head Coach Mick Cronin along with student-athletes Cashmere Wright, Sean Kilpatrick, and Yancy Gates.
Coach, opening statement.
COACH MICK CRONIN: Well, obviously, we're very excited to be moving on to Saturday. First, I want to congratulate Missouri and their players and Coach Anderson on a great season. They were tough to deal with tonight. Their style of play is disconcerting, to say the least.
They did take us out of a lot of stuff we were trying run, especially early in the game. But tonight, what they do is they make it a players' game. They really take it out of the coaches' hands. And so the last three days of practice, we tried to practice that.
And even our non-scholarship guys did a great job of helping us with our preparation, and kids did a great job tonight of attacking Missouri's pressure and just taking what was there, because you really can't dictate the game that much as a coach against them. Your players just gotta attack. And when we did that, we killed them inside, and second-chance points were big as well.
We had a definite advantage with Yancy and Thomas for sure, but even our guards got in the act. 21 second-chance points really helped get the separation to where we had a lead where we were pretty comfortable in the last 12, 15 minutes of the game. So great win for our team.
MODERATOR: We'll take questions for the student-athletes first, please.

Q. Yancy, three-pointers. What's that all about?
YANCY GATES: Oh, man. One, the shot clock was running down. The second one, I don't know really. I was just in rhythm. I just felt like it was a good shot and it went in.
COACH MICK CRONIN: You don't have to make excuses.

Q. Yancy, when the tournament started, we all knew there was 11 Big East teams. It seemed kind of inevitable we'd get two Big East teams against each other. Now that it's here, what does that say about the league, and just specifically what are your thoughts about playing Connecticut again?
CASHMERE WRIGHT: Well, actually, we knew that with UConn being in the whole tournament, they're one of the top teams in the Big East, and we actually felt good going in to playing them. They're a great team, and I think we do very well against them because of our attitudes and the how we approach some things during practice and our urgency towards a lot of things.
YANCY GATES: We saw them -- selection, we saw how early we could end up playing another Big East team. We kind of laughed about it because we knew we would probably end up playing one.
But UConn, they're hot right now. I don't know how fresh they are, but I figure if we can hold the young guys, then we should be okay.
Kemba Walker is going to do his thing or whatever, but once their young guys get going, that's when they really get in the groove and get to beating up on teams.

Q. You guys talked about earlier this week how you have impressed before so you thought you were prepared for Missouri. What did they do that you maybe weren't prepared for and how did you guys adjust so well?
CASHMERE WRIGHT: Just played hard. They just kept coming at us and kept coming. We really -- we really couldn't say we wasn't prepared. We knew what was going to happen. We watched film. We was ready. We knew what was going to happen and we just hopefully was prepared and just everything was going to happen right.
SEAN KILPATRICK: Coach told us that we couldn't over dribble in the press because they're small and they're actually fast. So once you beat one person a night, you only beat one person, but once you see someone open, then you gotta just throw it to them. So that was the easier way for us beating them.

Q. Yancy, they cut it to six. I think you scored a couple baskets there. When they got it down to six, did you think they had the momentum then, and how big were those baskets that you scored there?
YANCY GATES: Every team goes on a run some part of the game. So we knew they were on one and we knew we had to get some buckets to stop their run. So we just felt we had the advantage inside and we felt if we pounded them inside, even if we missed, we had the opportunity to get the offensive rebound, so that was big for us. And just not really worried about their run but making sure it didn't get too bad, to the point where they tied the game or took the lead.
MODERATOR: Other questions for the Cincinnati student-athletes?

Q. Cash, another key point early in the game when you got down 9-2, and I think it was 14-7, did it take you a while to settle down into the flow of the game or how did you recover from that?
CASHMERE WRIGHT: I mean, we just kept playing. I mean, you just know teams going to go on runs, you're gonna go down. You just gotta keep playing and hopefully they work at your advantage and you just come up with a victory.

Q. One more for Yancy. You talked about being from Cincinnati, and what it's meant to build this program back and another step to make it to the tournament. Now talk about another step now that you've actually won a game in the tournament.
YANCY GATES: That's big. We watch ESPN. A lot people had us losing because it was our first time here, but I just feel good about it, to be able to -- this is our first time that our group of guys made it, and the first time in, we got a win. So that just boosts our confidence to let us know we're capable to do anything we put our heads to.
MODERATOR: Any other questions for the Cincinnati student-athletes?
Okay. Guys, you're all set. Thank you.
Okay, we will reopen the floor for questions for Coach Cronin.

Q. Coming in taking over for a program that was decimated five years ago when Huggins left, somebody that you had coached with, coached against, it seemed like you needed to rebuild it and a lot of people would say get it to where he had it. And a lot of times when he was in the NCAA Tournament he was out the first weekend. So I think getting into the first weekend you basically, in my opinion, got it back to around where he had it. How do you get it beyond what it was before you came in?
COACH MICK CRONIN: Well, first of all, he never coached in the Big East at Cincinnati. I was with him a lot of those years, but I don't look at it that way. Everybody else does.
I'd be real frank with you. I'm never going to be beat Bob Huggins. He had a great run. The reason Cincinnati is in the Big East is because of what he accomplished as the coach at Cincinnati.
I'm real comfortable with being Mick Cronin. I knew what I was getting into when I took the job. Not only the rebuilding process, but also following the winningest coach ever at Cincinnati and everything that that was going to entail.
My game plan is to win games, graduate players, enjoy my job, enjoy doing it, and try to get my team better every year.
Our first goal right now is to find a way to win Saturday. That's a big key for us, find a way to win Saturday.
As far as the future, it's continue to build, develop a winning mentality. Intangibilities in our locker room is something that we've worked really hard on. We had to get players, then we had to build intangibles. That's been a big key for us to get the lead to where we had the 26 wins this year, the intangibles.
Now you have that in your program so you have it returning each year. We have a lot of guys back next year and a great recruiting class coming in, so we're just excited about where we're at as a staff.
For me it's gratifying, but more so probably for our players. They've been through a lot with the whole process. They hear about that stuff all the time, and to be honest, they don't know anything about it. They're really young. You forget how young these kids are. Six years ago some of our guys were in junior high.

Q. Coach, you touched on this a little earlier, but what specifically about that first meeting with UConn earlier this year not so long ago now sticks out in your mind as you prepare for Saturday night?
COACH MICK CRONIN: They shot the ball really well. I think they're 10-18 from 3. Other than that, I'll have to go back and watch the film. In our league I think the team that's the hungriest is probably going to win because teams are so evenly matched.
They had lost their previous game. I think we had won three or two in a row. I think we were coasting in, feeling too good about ourselves. But I think also our guys were overconfident because we had swept UConn the year before and they didn't understand how good their freshman were.
Our guys really understood -- they know how good Kemba is. They didn't understand Roscoe Smith and Jeremy Lamb and Shabazz Napier and all the things those guys bring to the table. So I think that's something that -- it's not going to mean we're going to win the game, but our guys are definitely going to have more respect for their personnel, I think, other than Kemba. Like I said, there's no doubt they respect him.

Q. Mick, would you rather play a team from another conference?
COACH MICK CRONIN: Absolutely.

Q. Why?
COACH MICK CRONIN: You know, the Big East is brutal. We've already played 20 of them. We played 18 in our league, not 16, two in the conference tournament. This is going to be our 21st against a Big East team.
I don't know how Coach Calhoun thinks. We talked earlier in the week, he and I, obviously both hoping we were going to get to play so we could be alive, but at the same time you'd like to avoid it. And I understand the tournament committee would like to avoid it too. But obviously it's unavoidable in certain situations.

Q. Can you tell me what you mean about how this was a player's game?
COACH MICK CRONIN: What Missouri does is they force you to attack them with their scrambling and their ball pressure and their denial, and they really take it out of the coach's hands where players have got to flash, catch, and play and make plays. And that's just their style. Mike's done that forever, and it's hard to play against, especially when your kids aren't used to it, so I was very thankful that we had three days to prepare for them.
But because of their defensive pressure and the way they scramble and change defenses and come at you, it's hard for me to call a play and say that it's going to go a, b, c to Yancy in the post. By the time it gets to b, they're going to take you out of the play.

Q. (Off Microphone)
COACH MICK CRONIN: We worked really hard on trying to attack them for easy baskets all week. Our preparation was to try to get our guys to make sure we threw over the top and we tried to attack them.
But I give all the credit to our players. Cashmere Wright's playing on a really bad knee. He had seven assists. And Dion Dixon handled the ball a lot, only had one turnover. Rashad Bishop's got no turnovers.
To play against Missouri and only have 11 turnovers is something to be proud of for your team. You're probably going to win, too, if you can accomplish that. Kansas may win the National Championship. They had 24 against them in their last game.

Q. Coach, I wanted to ask you about preparation because there are a lot of unusual aspects. Obviously you played Connecticut before, but they've recently caught fire, so maybe you think that they're a bit of a different team. How do you prepare? What edge do you think you have or why do you think you and your team's process is good in terms of this quick turnaround and being able to prepare for another opponent?
COACH MICK CRONIN: First of all, they played as well as they could play against us. It was 10-18 from 3 now. And they shot the ball -- I don't know if they've shot it better than that all year.
And I think the fallacy in the Big East, you think teams, well, they're not playing well when they lose. No, they're just playing other Big East teams.
In our league, you play well and lose. So I think they've been playing well all year. They got a great team. They didn't have their Head Coach the game before they played us, and there's no way that didn't affect them. That had to affect them.
So that being said, I don't know if we have any advantage or disadvantage. We're all the same. We've got one day to get ready to play each other. Team that plays better is going to win the game.

Q. You mentioned speaking to Jim Calhoun. Did his comments regarding the Big East voting, did his comments from New York about the Big East voting come up or was he able to clarify any of those comments for you?
COACH MICK CRONIN: We're both big fans of each other. And he gave me a call earlier in the week, and it's like I told him, I look up to him, I have great respect for him. I appreciated his call. He's protecting his player. He knows now I love his player and I voted for his player. So it's nice.
One thing about me is, because of the way I was raised, I like handling things the way they should be handled between coaches like the old days. I'm young, but I look at myself like I'm an old school guy. And it's an honor to coach against him.

Q. Coach, so there was a report today that you're likely going to get an extension at the school. Can you just talk about, does that make you feel good to have that happen now when you're in the tournament and make you more secure about going forward at Cincinnati?
COACH MICK CRONIN: I didn't know about that. Really?

Q. Yeah.
COACH MICK CRONIN: I'm honored to be the coach at the University of Cincinnati. As long as I'm the coach at Cincinnati, I look at it as a great honor, growing up a Bearcat fan.
And I have other personal reasons, obviously. I'm home. Get to spend time with my father and my brother. They're here today. So very few people in our business are coaching at home at their alma mater and at home. But that's news to me. All that stuff works itself out at the end of the day. You just gotta do your job.
MODERATOR: Thanks, Coach.

FastScripts Transcript by ASAP Sports

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